Dog Days

This week is the last hurrah. Reality returns next Wednesday when Natalia packs up her bag and heads off to school for the first day (just teachers, thankfully), kick-starting a whole sequence of events: everyone getting out of bed earlier, me figuring out a way to get two kids to daycare (and myself to work) before 10:30 am, and then figuring out how to get said kids back into bed before 10:30 pm so the whole cycle can begin again. Sigh. It's been a good summer.

Sadly, this week feels like March, with its steady rain and cool temperatures. We've needed the water, but couldn't it have waited until next week, when everyone was dour anyway? Last week we were lounging about outdoors until late, even eating dinners on our back porch a couple times. This week we've been holed up inside waiting for a break in the rain. I took Celia and Andres on a soggy walk to the train station today--it was fun for a bit, but the sight of commuters huddled under shelter just reminded me that our stretch of fun is almost over, and fall routines are just around the corner.

My cameras (photo and video) have been idle for a couple weeks. I'm noticing that I go through phases of intense documentary activity where I set up photo shoots and videotape everything--and then, just as quickly, I lose interest for a bit and everything begins to gather dust (though, in fairness, perhaps it is not a lack of interest but a recommitting to other things of importance). So there's nothing much new to report visually...I'll compensate by posting some video that I took a couple weeks ago, but which I've yet to comment upon.

Andres has taken a real liking to Toy Story. In his pantheon of Favorite Characters, Buzz and Woody now rank very close to Curious George, while Sid the Science Kid has slipped many notches (I think even SpongeBob now outranks poor Sid). Over the past few weeks, one of his favorite things to do has been to announce "To infinity, and beyond!" (in toddler speak, of course, so it ends up sounding like "To infininy, and me-on!" more often than not) and then jump off of whatever he happens to be standing on. In this clip, he models his fine flying form while his sister goes on the prowl for lost cheerios.



When not protecting the universe from the Evil Emperor Zurg, he can often be found playing hoops outside with Sean.



Celia, meanwhile, has somehow turned 9 months old. She is crawling well now--sometimes army crawling, and sometimes on her hands and knees (something her brother was never able to master!)--and manages to get everywhere. She pulls herself up also, so perhaps standing is not too far away. And she's become so playful--she loves peek-a-boo, and last night I discovered that she enjoys tearing down block towers that other people make. This cracked her up to no end. Just as soon as I had assembled a small tower she would tear it down, cackling with glee. I'll have to get a video of this before too long.

That's all I've got for now. I'm not ready to declare summer over yet, but the handwriting is on the wall--the days are shorter, before-school stress is upon us, and time no longer seems limitless. It's been a good summer. I'm sad to see it go.